


Grey-Blue Midnight

by PunkRockGrantaire



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Bleeding, Gen, Grantaire's terrible self esteem, Grim Reapers, Guardian Angels, I have no idea how to use ao3 tags, Pre-Relationship, Swearing, mild body horror, which counts as it's own character now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 06:13:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18330248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PunkRockGrantaire/pseuds/PunkRockGrantaire
Summary: He sighed, running a hand over his face, feeling grounded in the scratch of his chin, the rasping sound of skin on skin. He looked again at the striking student, sizing up the body – the shell too small now for all of that – and crossing his arms. “You can’t be older than I was,” he clarified, tilting his head slightly. “And you’re here getting murdered for some political cause that probably won’t last the decade. I hadn’t done anything.” He thought for a while. “I suppose they are right,” he started again. “that I make everyone equal, in the end.”A quiet, lonely reaper comes to gather the soul of the man with golden hair, not knowing that it would be the beginning of his longest journey yet.





	Grey-Blue Midnight

The room was grey-blue, like a movie scene set at midnight, the darkness of the night shattered by an electric moon, rigged up outside the window like flood lighting. The apartment’s living room was small, mostly square but for an alcove where a fireplace stood once, now filled with a worn-out sofa where a cat snored quietly. One wall was mostly windows, the gossamer curtains hiding hints of the Parisian skyline and that big, striking moon, where the other walls held the doors both out to the hallway and into the miniscule kitchen or bedroom. The grayscale light was kind to the chaos of the room, making it look more living and wistful than it would have that afternoon, when it was just a student flat belonging to a beautiful boy rushing off to work. The uncannily bright moonlight cut through the figure in the middle of the room as he looked around, who wouldn’t have looked out of place in a small student flat such as this, surrounded by the markers of a busy life, if the world had been kinder. His ripped, paint-splattered jeans were perhaps a few years out-of-style, but their owner had never cared much for that kind of distinction. He wore laced boots, designed for long walking, and a black sweater, the deep hood pushed back off his buoyant curls, even though wearing it that way always made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.  


Grantaire pet the cat on the sofa idly, smiling lightly as it squeaked sleepily and raised its head in a token recognition of his presence. It had loved the boy, and Grantaire hoped someone would think to come pick it up in time. He was such a busybody, the flat’s owner, and a small part of Grantaire’s heart worried that he’d never told his classmates or colleagues about the quiet tortoiseshell who had adopted him last winter when the streets had been too cold to sleep outside.

He continued to circle the room, slowly, knowing he was uncharacteristically worried more because of the tight knot between his eyebrows, developing into a headache, than because he was able to puzzle the emotion out for himself. He ran his hand over the bookshelves in the corner, feeling his finger tap tap tap along the books, ordered largest to smallest, like a body dragged down a flight of stairs. He chuckled, quietly, to himself, at the typically maudlin comparison. Well-used, ordered bookshelves and jackets flung across the back of the kitchen chair; Grantaire imagined a harried, passionate man with a sharp mind, but a busy body. He rested his calloused, thick-knuckled hand over his chest, feeling warmth as the image solidified in his mind. He found it important – increasingly important, nowadays – to know the people he was gathering, if only for a moment. 

Perhaps that why this one had been drinking coffee so late at night. Grantaire finally turned to the small kitchen. He did so with the air of a man facing a dreaded chore after days of finding progressively unimportant tasks as procrastination. Tucked behind the door was the small dining table, barely big enough for two. It was a hidden little thing in the corner, tiled with open textbooks, which in turn were being ignored under piles of political pamphlets due to be delivered across the area tomorrow. The boy’s colleagues would have to work overtime, now. Grantaire knelt down beside the student, whose head was down on his chest as if he had fallen asleep. He would have imagined the long nights working had simply caught up on the boy, but Grantaire had felt him calling from outside. Though Grantaire didn’t imagine he had been drinking in Paris – hadn’t it been Rome, or Istanbul, where he had heard the tea cup strike the linoleum floor? He had stepped out the door and found himself here. This was an important one. He could feel it.

He reached down for the teacup, lifting it from where it cradled the last of its content in the lip of its rim, the final drops from the small puddle, paused in spreading along the simulated grout between the linoleum tile pattern. The cup stayed where it lay, undisturbed, as Grantaire quietly lifted and observed the shadow of the thing at eye level, inspecting it, pulling it in to smell its shadowy contents. He grimaced, dropping the mug.

“Nasty stuff.” he muttered, not wanting to break the calm of the apartment by talking loudly, though no nosy neighbours would be up to hear him, if they could. Despite himself, the dust dancing in the moon beams, filtering in from the living room, stuttered and whirled in his breath, which had gone unused until he’d needed it for sound. “How did you manage to piss someone off who would be willing to do this already?” Grantaire didn’t dare touch him, but couldn’t resist the aborted hand movement, as if he was going to brush those golden locks out the lidded eyes. He sighed, deeply, resting his hip on the edge of that small, lonely table, barely big enough to share coffee with a friend over. Grantaire wondered if the beautiful boy hosted friends in the almost-square living room, instead. He couldn’t imagine him being lonely – even resting in a still, almost-blue midnight, the boy looked like he could hold a room. Grantaire was struck with the sudden thought that he would follow him anywhere, but knew it was an illogical thought, borne from the same place as that strange, unplaced worry resting at the pulled-tight centre of his heavy brows. He sighed, running a hand over his face, feeling grounded in the scratch of his chin, the rasping sound of skin on skin. He looked again at the striking student, sizing up the body – the shell too small now for all of that – and crossing his arms. “You can’t be older than I was,” he clarified, tilting his head slightly. “And you’re here getting murdered for some political cause that probably won’t last the decade. I hadn’t done anything.” He thought for a while. “I suppose they’re right,” he started again. “that everyone’s equal in the end.”

Grantaire suddenly felt like his blue moment was up. His time with the beautiful boy was at an end, the grace period he’s granted to learn about the life he was gathering up. Soon, the moonlight would retreat to his clouds – the dust motes would settle again, and the cat would rouse itself and begin to think about breakfast. He stood, looking down at that golden hair, dissipating the melancholy of the apartment with a moment of intent.  
“Alright.” He murmured, reaching down to grip the boy by the shoulder, feeling as though he was reluctantly waking a friend from a long-deserved nap. “It’s time to wake up. Come on, time to go.” He increased his volume and the shaking slightly, hearing a bell in his raspy voice, clearing the dust from the light with each toll, and rousing the slumbering spirit, which Grantaire felt unfurl like a hermit crab, knowing more by instinct than thought that it must abandon it’s too-small shell. Grantaire saw the shadow of throat work over the completely still flesh, like someone working up to a mutter of complaint at being roused. It was gentle, and dark, and everything Grantaire had seen before. He pulled away.

Where his hand had been touching him, bright orange-pink light was shining out, like a burnt sunrise.

“What the Shit.” Grantaire exclaimed, hearing the second toll of the bell rattle unsurely around the unconventional sentence. “Oh fuck.” He added, as if to clarify his feelings to the newly-ringing apartment as he realised what was happening. All of the great quiet he had been enjoying was dispelled from the room like a tidal wave, pushed out of the cracks in the window seams and floor boards to make way for this bright – and brightening – light. Grantaire stepped back, blindly reaching into his pocket, unable to look away from the man. He was rising from the chair now, as if pulled by a string at his clavicle, that same light piercing out from him and burning Grantaire’s eyes. He felt hot liquid streaming out from the corners, but at least when he walked around wearing a mortal shroud he was mostly protected from the pain, and not really in danger from any damage dealt to it.  


This was important now, as no mortal body was going to survive the birth of an Angel.

Grantaire fumbled for his phone – his Focus - but it caught on the edge of his jean pocket as he pulled it out, sliding forward out of his reach over the cheap carpet. Through the doorway to the kitchen, Grantaire can see the man has turned almost all the way to a ball of light, bathed in it and calling to him. He can’t step forward to retrieve it. “Shit, shit, shit” he repeated to himself, until his back hit the thick door to leave the apartment. “Joly!” he called under his breath. “Eponine!” as well. He felt his lips split with the effort of calling his friends with a mortal voice, no Focus to channel it. He didn’t know how to express how much he didn’t want to be in the room with the man with the golden hair. “Angel!” he shouted now. “New angel! Please,” he begged, feeling like a child calling his mother to take him home, but he didn’t want to be here, didn’t want to be the first thing this new golden angel saw, this holy Apollo who was supposed to start a new immortal life, who was going to experience the first moment of that life with miserable little Grantaire to welcome him.  


God, he hated angels. And he hated reaping them.

But no one heard him, or maybe the roaring light of the birth scraped away his shadows before they could reach his friends. He was alone, here to stand tall and welcome the new born, to represent everything this grand new world can be.

He spun and wrenched at the door. It didn’t even rattle on its hinges, practically part of the wall around it.

“Fuck!” He shouted, running low on imagination for expressing himself about this situation. He rattled the door handle again, shaking with frustration and anxiety and wishing desperately for the mercy of the door opening and freedom being his. But it was no lock that kept him here. Damn the rules. Damn this door, damn him for feeling called to this man – there must have been closer reapers, in turn closer souls for him to have gathered in Istanbul, or wherever he had stepped out. Why had this soul called him? The door held no answers, and behind him, Grantaire heard a gentle gasp, the involuntary spasm of the throat by someone newly-immortal, not knowing or feeling yet that it didn’t need the air.

“What- who are-“ Grantaire turned, wrathful eyes resting on the man in the doorway, whose hair waved and moved with an imagined breeze, who was clinging to the wood and looking at Grantaire with open confusion and need. He needed answers, clarification, meaning. All things Grantaire couldn’t give – he was fucking it up already. The golden-haired man gasped, leaning back in surprise. “Your- your eyes- “  


Grantaire growled to himself, angry at the situation, at his handling of it, mostly at this man for saying yes and making the reaper’s life all the more complicated. Grantaire raised his hand, as if calling for silence, and as he brought it down, he did so with a long staff in his hand, a curved blade at the top reflecting the light of the moon into the angel’s eyes. As the tip of the scythe struck the floor, a final bell rang resolutely, and Grantaire was swathed in shadows, rising like flames constructed of black cloth around him. It climbed his body in a heartbeat, washing away the mortal shell and bathing his face in shadows. He felt the darkness rise on his side of the room to war with the natural light seeming to shine from the new born.

The man’s eyes widened in surprise, and recognition – Grantaire had chosen a traditional image, to say the least.

“You’re-“ he started, and Grantaire tilted his head.

“I’m what they would have offered you next, if you’d said no to the light and dramatic trumpets.”

“Trumpets?” he asked, confusion writ large on his face. Grantaire rolled his eyes beneath the hood and walked towards the other man, who still stood in the doorway between the square room and the tiny kitchen. He made it to within a foot of the man – standing, Grantaire realised bitterly that what had seemed like a diminutive corpse had stood up to be a head taller than him. Of course. The angel looked down at him, distrust and that same confusion warring on his face for reliance – Grantaire knew he was the only source of answers available. In a flash, he remembers his own distant fear at his night like this, but it’s gone like thunder rolling across a landscape. He doesn’t feel the need to summon pity for this being, that will from now always be more than Grantaire.

“Excuse me.” He said, shortly, tilting his head past the man.

“That doesn’t seem… fair” he said, looking down at Grantaire. The reaper raised an eyebrow, knowing that even behind the hood his meaning is expressed. “Not to tell us all the options. To offer with… omission.”

“Fair.” Grantaire said, hoping that the derision in his tone would wash away the stranger’s need to keep talking. He cleared his throat, completely purposefully, as he didn’t really have a throat in the moment. “Let me pass.”

“Why?”

“You ask too many questions.” He huffed. The angel paused, tilting his head as if thinking, as he watched the shadow of Grantaire’s hood shrewdly.

“That was technically my first.” He said, and Grantaire breathed hard out of his nose in frustration, tamping down the urge to welcome him into this world with an argument.

“Every move you make is full of them. And I’m counting ‘trumpets.” He deflated a little, knowing he should give the new born at least the simplest answer. “Unless you intend to fulfil your duties in this small flat, I need to cut you free. So let me past.”

Inquisitive, the man turned aside, allowing Grantaire to glide past into the kitchen. Grantaire felt that same pang of sadness at the sight of the body, though maybe it was paired now with bitterness that this wasn’t as simple as he had thought it would be. He heard the man behind him hum, interested, as he saw for the first time the gossamer golden thread waving and moving languidly between the angel and his shell. Grantaire reached out and touched it, pulling it to inspect it for a moment.

“Duties.” The angel said to himself. Grantaire looked over at him.

“Unless the pitch has changed since I heard it, you should have some ideas what they are.”

“It said I-“ he began, before Grantaire cut him off a little too harshly.

“I know. I just said I’ve heard the pitch.”

“But they offered-“

“Stop.” Grantaire rasped. Golden dust danced on his fingers around the thread in the silence. “I don’t want to hear it.”

The silence stretched, and after he couldn’t stand to watch the thread any longer, he looked up, to see the angel staring at him, unabashed and intrigued. Why must reapers gather the angels? Grantaire thought, bitterly. In life, shadows are born out of light. What is it about the afterlife that reverses that, forces this beautiful thing to look at Grantaire's shadowy, cracked spirit as its first welcome to the rest of time?

“Do you have a name?” the angel asks, astutely. Grantaire gives him his most recent, simpler than a long explanation.

“Grantaire.”

“Hello.” The angel said. It occurred to Grantaire that he’s trying to start again, trying to work out how to make something good out of an interaction with this empty little Death. It twists Grantaire up inside to not live up to something, again. “I’m Enjolras.” The angel reached out a hand as if to shake. Grantaire gripped his scythe in one hand, the golden thread in the other. 

“Enjolras.” He says, and the name feels like something, bouncing around in his teeth. “I hope you never have to see me again.”

He cuts the thread.

The room is grey-black. The moon has retreated again behind the clouds, and in the almost-square room, Grantaire is alone again.

**Author's Note:**

> I have no existing Les Mis mutuals to share this little thing with so you're all having to deal with it here instead! On that note I'm very much looking for some Les Mis mutuals to scream at so please come and find me at [PunkRockGrantaire](%E2%80%9Dpunkrockgrantaire.tumblr.com%E2%80%9D).
> 
> I very much hope for this to become a series, as I have a lot more in mind, but for now I want to make sure it stands as a close oneshot. Please feed me with your comments and thoughts!!
> 
> Also, credit to Acrosseverystar on tumblr for giving me a kick out the door to actually publish this :)


End file.
